Category: Golf

• PIF ends investment after five years and $5bn

• LIV announces new independent board in funding push

LIV Golf has launched its search for fresh investment in a race against time to save its future after official confirmation Saudi funding would cease at the end of the 2026 season.

Hours after LIV announced the creation of a new independent board minus Yasir al-Rumayyan, the governor of Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund, a PIF statement formally substantiated the rumours that it was pulling the plug on the start-up after around $5bn (£3.7bn) of investment.

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• LIV staring at closure in absence of alternative funds

• Leading names expected to eye return to main tours

LIV Golf executives are poised to confirm to players that Saudi Arabia’s funding of the circuit will cease at the end of 2026, in a move that will begin a scramble between some leading names in the sport to return to traditional tours.

Without an alternative and unlikely funding source from 2027 onwards, LIV in its current form is staring at closure just four years on from staging its first tournament. Nothing has materially changed for LIV in recent weeks yet formal admission of an upcoming Saudi exit will be viewed as a key moment in a disruption story that is heading towards a messy finale.

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• Tournament was due to take place from 25-28 June

• Louisiana expects LIV to return incentive funding

The LIV Golf event scheduled to be played in Louisiana in June has been postponed, state officials said on Tuesday.

News of the postponement comes less than two weeks after LIV Golf CEO Scott O’Neil said the breakaway circuit’s 2026 season would proceed as planned amid reports that the series was at risk of losing its funding.

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• American led from first round at Memorial Park

• Korda leads rankings for first time since August

Nelly Korda won the Chevron Championship on Sunday with a performance worthy of her return to the No 1 ranking in women’s golf.

Holding a five-shot lead at the start of the final round, Korda was efficient as ever and no one could get closer than four shots all afternoon at Memorial Park. She closed with a two-under 70 for a five-shot victory to capture the third major of her career.

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• Furyk in line for second stint as US captain

• Woods steps aside after arrest and treatment

• Europe chasing third straight win in Ireland

Jim Furyk is returning as US Ryder Cup captain for the 2027 matches in Ireland as the Americans try to get back on track against a European team that has dominated the last three decades, the Associated Press has learned.

Furyk would be the fourth US captain to get a second chance dating to 1979, considered the modern era of the Ryder Cup when continental Europe became part of it.

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• Prices almost double those in Rome three years ago

• Organisers promise ‘enhanced onsite experience’ for fans

Ryder Cup Europe has doubled the cost of a ticket to attend next year’s marquee event when the US will seek to regain the trophy at Adare Manor in County Limerick.

Organisers will charge fans €499 (£434) for a daily ticket when a batch are released to those living in Ireland, where the centenary event is being held, on Friday. That is almost double the €260 face value spectators paid in Rome three years ago.

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• English player wins at first playoff hole with birdie

• Fitzpatrick claims second PGA Tour victory of year

England’s Matt Fitzpatrick beat the world No 1, Scottie Scheffler, in a playoff to win the RBC Heritage for the second time.

Fitzpatrick took a three-shot into the final round at Hilton Head and still held that advantage standing on the 15th tee. But playing partner Scheffler produced birdies at 15 and 16 and Fitzpatrick’s duffed chip on 18 cost him a bogey, sending him into a playoff that he looked second favourite to win.

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• Scott O’Neil rejects claims LIV is close to collapse

• ‘Structural changes’ afoot, chief executive says

The LIV Golf chief executive, Scott O’Neil, has admitted the nascent golf league’s finances are “managed very tightly” and said structural changes are on the way that would probably mean they needed to raise money, but he remained adamant the league would not fold.

He was interviewed by LIV employees during the TV broadcast of the first round of the rebel tour’s Mexico City leg, a day after reports that Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund was to cut its funding for the league it helped launch in 2022.

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• Filing details remarks about drones over home

• Woods said he spoke to ‘the president’ after crash

• Prosecutors seek access to prescription records

Tiger Woods told police he had taken multiple prescription medications, including Vicodin, on the day of a crash that led to his arrest on suspicion of driving under the influence, according to court filings released on Wednesday.

The filing, submitted by prosecutors in Florida as part of routine pretrial discovery and obtained by the Guardian, also details a series of unusual remarks Woods made to officers at the scene of the 27 March crash in Hobe Sound, including references to drones flying over his home and a claim that he had spoken to “the president”.

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• LIV chief’s rallying email to staff did not refer to 2027

• Without alternative funding future is bleak for rebel tour

Several of golf’s leading names are facing career limbo at the end of 2026 amid expectation Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund will withdraw backing for the LIV Tour.

While the likelihood is Bryson DeChambeau and Jon Rahm will be afforded a pathway back to the PGA Tour, the future for others who made lucrative switches to LIV is far more uncertain.

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The Grand National, Masters, Paris-Roubaix and Champions League put it ahead of even July’s mighty trifecta

The thought struck me on the last rattler back from the Grand National, as Avanti’s wifi faltered somewhere outside Crewe and the Masters stream on my phone froze yet again. I was watching the world’s best golf tournament, on a train journey back from the world’s greatest steeplechase, having seen the best football match of the season – Real Madrid against Bayern Munich – earlier in the week. Is there a better month in the sporting calendar than April?

Augusta always delivers. Club football hits peak levels of drama and jeopardy. Then there is Aintree, Paris-Roubaix, the start of the County Championship cricket season and the World Snooker Championship. To round it off, the life-affirming sight of the great and the ordinary doing remarkable things at the London Marathon. “April is the cruellest month,” writes TS Eliot in The Waste Land. But he was not a sporting man and was living in very different times.

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• Englishman led for a time in final round on back nine

• ‘These are the tournaments I focus on,’ says 45-year-old

Justin Rose refused to write off his major chances after another Masters near-miss. The 2013 US Open winner lost a playoff to Rory McIlroy at Augusta a year ago and held the lead on the back nine on Sunday before finishing in a tie for third, two shots behind the Northern Irishman who successfully defended his title.

It was Rose’s third top-six finish in his past eight major appearances and the 45-year-old, a winner on the PGA Tour in February, believes he can compete at the highest level. “In the last two years I’ve really re-kicked on and re-energised my career and myself and have a lot of belief there is a lot of runway ahead,” he said after shooting a final-round 70 having come undone at Amen Corner.

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• US president praises 36-year-old’s victory under pressure

• McIlroy held nerve to beat world No 1 Scheffler by a shot

Donald Trump called Rory McIlroy a “legend” as the United States president congratulated the Northern Irishman on his second Masters title.

McIlroy held on for a one-shot victory over America’s world No 1 Scottie Scheffler, becoming only the fourth player in the tournament’s 90-year history to win successive titles at Augusta.

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